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It’s been so long, why ever don’t you keep track of time! And let me know where you have been! Such troubled times are upon us again, and even from up high where I am sitting things can look pretty grim.

But Stella, dear Stella, I am about to tell you the news! Let me start with something nice, something fun, something uplifting! My baking, remember me making cookies and what not? Scraping for the last grains, and bits o’ flour and whatever I can find? Well it’s taking off. Oh silly, I didn’t give up college, of course not. I am still… registered. But Stella, don’t divert me into the dark muddy waters of life I don’t want to think of! The baking, Stella, it’s taking off. Oh the ingredients vary, Stella, they really do. I now have access to more… more unusual items, if you like. Nothing harmful, of course not, natural and natural only, with a creative touch, but not to harm them sleepers, Stella, just to aid a bit.

Oh I must tell you immediately, I have finally opened a little stall to sell all the baked wonders to the public, on Sundays, at the market which is on at the place where I live right now. Remember, I told you before about my great move and how I no longer live alone? Oh dear Stella! Your memory, it’s more peculiar than snow in June! I have been thinking of what to call it, I can’t come up with much, my imagination is as dry as sand in a desert, it’s there in abundance but just useless and plain… But Stella, do help? You are forever so creative…

I am being all business oriented, don’t laugh Stella! I am thinking of co-operating with another man, he has access to some herbs that might add some nice taste and flavors to cooking, you know what I mean, you do, don’t you?

And now the dark grim news, my lovely, something that I want to forget for it disturbs me. Oh, before I carry on, I must tell you, that it was not the ghost of my father haunting me at my old place. What was it? Oh I ask myself the same question, Stella. I got an impression that the source was implying I was “under influence”! How dare they suggest that, I ask you! Oh how unreasonable and rude! I am certain, I am completely certain something is up. I must check it out myself at some point.

But the news, Stella, I must tell you right away! I was walking home last night, the usual route, nothing peculiar, nothing out of the ordinary. And then I come across a terrier, a dog, you know the yappy type. Oh I am not a fan of them at all, but there it was. And then, as if possessed it started bashing its stupid little head (I ask you, how can one fit a brain in a skull that size?) against the wall. Silly creature. And before I knew it, off it went into the river. Yes, Stella, just jumped in! How odd! I am not a good swimmer, you know that, nor do I like terriers, but it was a creature in need of help. So I jump right after the stupid thing and save him. Oh Stella, I was wet to the last thread of my shirt. Blood dripping from its head, his skull must have been split open! So I brought him home…

Oh my dear, someone is at the door, I better put this all away. I shall return soon, Stella, I shall.

She sat alone. Rain was smashing droplets violently against the tall windows. The remains of the droplets slid down to form puddles… It has been raining for hours now. She has been sitting at the table, probably also for hours, stirring the cold black coffee. Clockwise. Anticlockwise. Clockwise again. She was blankly staring into the distance, her eyes were as void as the campus she was looking towards. Her feet were almost dry: the genius idea of wearing sandals even when it’s cold but forecast to rain. “At least your feet will dry much faster than if you wear proper shoes!” was her logical argument. She stuck by it.

He appeared out of nowhere. Tall, not strikingly good-looking, but not too unpleasant to look at. The was a certain air of… charm. Would one call it charm? No, it can’t be charm, charm can’t act like a force field disturbing one’s state of mind. He walked over and sat across from her. Right in the middle of her gaze path. Blocking the empty campus.

She shook her head and muttered “Hi”. As if she knew him. As if she even had to greet someone who so rudely intruded on her privacy. The conversation started the same way as any other: college, weather… it died the same way as any small talk would die: quietly and gently. He sat there. So did she. Then, he started to talk about philosophy of mind, aura, perception… At first, she was bored. Yet another pretentious philosophy student, perhaps he was even in her class. She’d know if she attended lectures. But she did not. Most of what he said was flying directly into one ear through her head and out the other ear. Delay time was non-existent. It was only when he started to talk about some esoteric things, that her eyes lit up. Or rather they appeared to have more than just a green void to them. She said nothing, just stared. All she remembers is him suggesting to come and meet the others. And her saying a sharp “yes” and interrupting him half-sentence.

He didn’t leave a number. Or a name. Or a trace. He just left. She sat stirring the cold black coffee. Clockwise. Anticlockwise. Clockwise again. Her feet were now dry. The rain has stopped.

I hope this finds you well, so many are not feeling all that good these days, and no surprise with what’s been happening! Makes me wonder what is next on our path!…

Oh but I was meant to come to the consilium meeting on Tuesday, but I did not, I do not know if you were there.

But do let me get straight onto the subject, why, I should not keep you reading and reading, and oh my letter is getting messy! But look at me again, getting distracted!

Something terrible happened, I thought I’d tell you, being my mentor since the beginning, who else am I to say it to. Oh but maybe Bradan, but then he’s busy, with all the things happening!

I had a dream, but what a generic term it is, it was hardly a dream, it was a nightmare, or a vision, or some obfuscated reality masked as a dream, oh I don’t know what the scientific term is!

But it happened on Monday night, I was going to bed, oh but it’s not in my style to be telling all this, but I feel I have to. Look at my hands trembling even now! As I remember that awful night!… You probably wonder if I am OK, but of course I am, oh I did have a gin or two, but don’t you think I am drunk! It’s not my style at all to be drinking to get drunk! I just took a sip to calm my nerves, and oh to stop the shaking.

But let me just compose myself, I don’t want to be wasting your time, oh look at me again, rambling on like that. But that’s exactly what I am doing!

Oh but here, I will tell you what happened. I was in bed, my eyes were closed. I was thinking about things, you know the usual, what happened to our city and why and John missing, though I didn’t know him, but Perrin, a Guardian being drunk, oh how odd and frightening it is! What drove her to that… Oh but it has nothing to do with what happened. And then, when I thought I was asleep, I had this dream, as if the room went deathly cold, and something stood in front of me. Oh it had a shape of a human, but it was blurry and like a shadow! You must think I am drunk and seeing things, but don’t you think of me like that! And so it stood there, I could feel it’s cold breath on my cheek. And as if it was trying to tell me something. Oh I was scared, I was terrified! And why would I not be! And then, the room was dark, oh the aura has changed, things were not like they were before! It was filled with darkness and rotten smell. Oh I tried to scream, I tried to move, but I could not, as if held down by some invisible force! Oh I was scared, my hands were trembling, my heart was racing! And it walked around the room and then came back to me again, and I swear it looked at me and tried to say something. And then just vanished, as quickly at it appeared!

Oh but then I got off the bed, and I was shaking, just went over to my cupboard and had a gin or two, oh but I was not drunk! It was just to calm my nerves! And then I sat down to compose this to you, to tell you about it at all.

Oh look at me spilling tea on this letter now, how messy of me!

Do you think, Bardiel, do you think someone is trying to get to me? Someone… who may not be here, but is there?… Do you think it’s possible?

I am going to run now, I have taken much of your time already, but do let me finish this, maybe you will get ideas, being more experienced and that!

Snow, white blinding snow. Was it glowing? Why did it seem like there was a green glowing tint to it? It seemed so for only a second, but was as real as you and me. Oh, what an accusation to make! “Real”, what is real and what is not!

Remember, remember that day? Cold was biting passer-by’s cheeks, cars reluctantly warming up their engines… and the fields, white, pure, innocent fields, and foot steps. A trail of lonely foot steps in no direction, just forward till the nearest obstruction and then back. They were forming a maze.

Remember tension? Clutching fists until the knuckles matched snow: white, pure and cold. Swollen eyes and frozen bright red cheeks? It was just a dream, nothing more, nothing less. And yet, the effect was unlike any other. It was always there. Aren’t people meant to forget their dreams? Dreams are not meant to lurk around, feed into thoughts, reflect in bowls of soup, follow up and down the stairs and worst of all – hide. Dreams are not meant to be so realistic. Dreams are meant to be just fiction, a summary of day’s work.

She slowly opened the door to veranda. He was sitting in the rocking chair, as usual, reading the latest issue of his favorite Australian Literature Journal, also as usual. One hand holding a cup of dark, like Malevich’s famous square, coffee. It was probably too cold to drink without disgust. But he still sipped at it, as if it was burning his lips.

She sat in the wicker chair, shaking snow off her shoes and watching it form puddles on the oak floor. Silence. Smell of cinnamon buns crawling around the corner from the kitchen and cautiously lurking in the room. Just another February day. As she reached to get Kafka (she decided to read his work ever since her dad briefly mentioned him, she was told she’s too young to understand or follow, that was enough to spark stubbornness and spite to prove everyone wrong). He said, without lifting his head away from the journal or looking at her over his reading glasses as he usually would,

“Could you pass me the phone just for a moment, I need to make a phone call?”

She did. She also left the room. It felt like her presence would be a burden, unlike the usual when he’d chatter on to the college professors about everything form literature to “what a high price we’re paying for fruit and veg these days!”. It felt cold. Much colder than a few seconds ago.

She went to her room, aimlessly lifted and placed back several containers with pencils, shuffled around sheets of paper. Her mind was wondering what kind of phone call did he have to make that her presence was so unwanted. Her parents always included her into any business, be it family or work.
Remember how silence was growing, it’s fat fluffy hands shutting your ears and awkwardly pressing on your head? Remember, it was still bright, the snow was melting. Remember?

As if shaken by some invisible hand, she opened her eyes. All this time she was standing in the center of the room.

Remember the darkness? How it spread everywhere and the bright flash.. and then nothing? Remember how Something tried to speak… Something almost human-shaped? And silence. And loud shriek. And silence again.

She ran downstairs,

“Daddy!”, whispering at first, and then, shrieking (Remember?…),

“DADDY!!!”, as she threw the veranda doors open, banging them against the walls.

He was sitting in the rocking chair, as usual. The latest issue of his favorite Australian Literature Journal was on the floor, underneath his hand… that was hanging as a wet towel off a hook. The other hand on his chest. The black goo that was meant to be coffee spilt on the floor, merging with the water from her shoes, osmosis…

The light was faint, it was softly reflecting off the tall pale walls of the room. The walls were bare concrete covered with a few layers of white emulsion, the cheap type one can buy in bulk and it comes on crates in huge buckets which buckle as you lift them and wonder if the handle will break now or just as you bring it to you car.
The room was small, with just about enough space for a bed, desk and wardrobe which awkwardly stood half way the ceiling height reminding of how this whole construction was not designed for permanent living.

On the chair by the desk sat a girl. Tall, bony, but still with a healthy amount of muscle, the way one would picture a healthy active young child. Her hair, a light brown-blond color, was barely brushed, and lying flat past her shoulders, thin strands caught in the strings of her top. She would occasionally brush it all back from her face as she leant back on the chair. Were her hands wet with sweat or tears.. it’s hard to say, the room was too dark. She was writing, frantically, messy, childish handwriting, letters crowding on top of each other, pushing each other off the page and curling down to finish the word. Like a child she’d suck on the end of her pen, then suddenly remember what she was told about the germs and jerk it out, at times hurting her gums. Beside the table lamp stood a small glass, not crystal or anything fancy, just a glass, half filled with gooseberry gin and no tonic. Further away, by the bedroom locker stood the bottle. Beside the glass was a mug of tea, with the tea bag label hanging by the handle and getting in the way of grabbing the mug without pulling the tea bag out, this often lead to spillages.

Now and then, when she’d lean back to brush the hair off her face, she’d take a sip of the gin, look around the room with scared eyes, like a rabbit does when in the middle of the forest hiding from the chase. Quickly she’d turn back to whatever it is she was writing and continue. Looking closely, one could even count the vertebrae of her spine, some would say she looked starved, others would say she was a slim-built. Her face, still looked like that of a teenager, the type that parents look out and go “awww is she not cute?”, except the cute-and-girly part never crossed her life and was an unknown concept to the tall girl in grey combats and a dark green string top.

The more gin she’d down, the messier her handwriting got, the more frantic and scared the gaze in the big green eyes would be, the more she’d jump from one thought to another.

She was pacing around. The room was narrow, with a wide beam of light coming through the only window carefully camouflaged to be a part of the ceiling and unvarnished timber floor. She was barefoot.

Her mind was rushing from one temple to another, blood throbbing through the veins as if about to boil over and spill onto the floor though every pore of her body. She was different now. Everything was different now.

“Everything… Everything… Everything… ” She paced faster, with each step becoming more and more conscious of how she steps, where her weight distribution lies.

“Daddy, if you can see me… if you can see me at all…” She muttered, head down, as if counting steps. Rigid, heavy steps. She talked to him a lot. Even if he is dead. Has been dead. For years. For longer than she cared to admit. She still talked to him. She knew his energy was around. His aura. His presence. His physical state may be gone, rotted away with the little timber box that contained his ashes and was buried deep down. He was still with her. Even if she can’t see him.

“Everything has changed. It was true. It was all true. “

She stopped suddenly, lifting her head, her fair hair stuck to her face, glued with sweat in some random pattern that only morning frost is capable of.

“But now… now that I know… now that I know what I know is true, that it all exists…”, she touched the little amber pendant hanging around her neck on a silver thread, “Now that I know who I really am…”

Her mind was carefully picking up pieces of her memory and placing them neatly next to what was the new understanding, a completely different feeling, but somehow still familiar. In her head, she was trying to superimpose her new knowledge with the common theories, various hypothesises she learnt in lectures (the ones that she attended), books that she read growing up. There was more to reality than she knew before and it didn’t have to do with maturity or wisdom or getting older, it was to do with something new, something different, something that she was now a part of. That Something bothered her and refused to leave her, perhaps that Something has chained itself to her ankle and dragged itself with her everywhere she went, reminding her that things have changed, that everything is now not like what it appeared before…

“Nothing is what it is…. No-one is what it seems…” was imprinted on the inside of her eyelids, reminding her each time that she needs more. More knowledge, more information, more clues…. then she will be able to figure out what that Something is and decide what to do with it.

“It’s time, come on, look at the horrible mess that you are!”, she said to herself, wiping the sweat mixed with tears off her face. She then ran her fingers through her long fair hair, quickly and carelessly, trying to make herself look neat. She didn’t want any questions asked, for she was not in the mood to come up with answers and she has already exceeded her weekly dose of rudeness towards those around her.

She ran down the stairs, jumping over the last three steps and landing with a loud “thud” .